GIANTS AND PIGMIES.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXIII, 7 April 1926, Page 12

GIANTS AND PIGMIES.

AFRICAN PETER PANS. 75,000 MILKS UNARMED. An Engislumiii, who was quite unarmed and who has travelled during the last ten years 73,000 miles in Africa, has just returned to London on furlough (says the Loudon Daily Chronicle). In a forest encampment, to reach which lie had to crawl underground, Air AY. J. AY. Roome. E.R.G.S., who is a secretary for the British and Foreign Bible Society, came across a colony of pigmies. Few were more than four feet in height; little mothers of three feet nine inches were nursing their babies. Tie was also the guest- of a seven-foot king who rules over a great nation, many of whom are as tall as himself. Alauy are athletes, who would put Olympic champions to the blush. Strange unknown tribes, when they saw the explorer, were awed, for they had never before seen a white man. ’The man who has seen all this, and who lias, pushed his way through the Dark Continent often with no more -deadly equipment than a bicycle and a. camera, stood before a large map ol ■Africa, recently and gave some idea of his iourneyings. Air Roome is by profession a- surveyor ami architect, but for some years has been the Bible Society’s secretary in East and Central Africa. Five tiinc-s he has crossed Africa. east to West, from the Indian Ocean to. the Atlantic: five times lie has journeyed from north to', south, from South Africa- to the AJediterranean —a record tor African travel. His is not exactly the mission of a. George Borrow, though the vagrant life he lias led has brought him in touch, with people far stranger than the champion of the gipsy could ever have imagined. Air Ronnie's great task has been the making of an ethnographic surrey of the continent. Jt has been his work to discover as tar as possible, bow many languages and bow maiiy dialects are spoken and to arrange betiveen missionaries ami the Governments concerned, eontereiiees with the object of reducing' the -medley of tongues into delinile languages. One of the most imporlaul Lusks in the Christianisiitiou of Africa is to overcome the hundred and one language difficulties. Already Air Roome has published the resii't of lii.s years of research in a ntap which gives a chart of the tribes and Mib-tribes, the position of all languages and dialects used in educational work and a chart showing the extent- of Islamic influence on the I’agan tribes. Air Roome has also completed a gaactum- giving data of 300 tribes and main Mill-tribes” Bill then- is still much to accomplish, and the quiet, unassuming explorer return's lo his task- and his adventures in the autumn. On a recent run of 2000 . miles ho went -with his cycle from Aloinit Kilimanjaro, Africa's great snow-capped! mountain, lo Salisbury, Rhodesia, j

through the wild parts of 'Tanganyika, >iyassalaiul and Portugese Fast Africa. For ‘IOU miles of that journey Mr Hooiuc and his .four native hoys had to push their cycles across sandy wastes and mountains., J t took them eightylive days to travel from one missionary station to another in the primitive country in north-vest Congo and the French Chari Chad territory. It was the great belt of forest, 1000 miles in length, and from f>oo to t>oo miles at this part that Mr lloome saw the real pigmies. Previously lie had been through the forest without seeing a trace of the queer little people. “They live right iu the heart of the forest, ' 1 lie said, “and are without doubt the wildest'specimens of human, ity existing at the present time. r l hey are the real pigmies and not like the pigmy mongr<4 s, one taller, one sees on the I'ganda border. On approach they run like rabbits and hide behind the trees. 1 have pulled foliage aside and seen the little eyes peeping at me. We met one pigmy on our way iu the forest, and by signs persuaded him to lead us to his people. Right in. the do use undergrowth we came, to a. little opening not more than three feet hi-ili through which we hail to erawl. This went on for some hundred yards, and then the passage-way in the forestopened np so that we could stand. Then we eaitie to a stream at one side of which we saw tiny tool-prints. The other side was a wall of trees. We sent on our pigmy guide to prepare his fellows for our visit, otherwise wo might have been greeted with a shower of poisoned arrows. Presently he returned and wo went on to the little encampment of about a quarter of an acre, iu which were fifty people. I saw there was a chance of a photograph, as a great tree had fallen, and there was a little light. The pigmies danced away, and I got- a very good photograph. They live just like animals, and entirely by bunting. They carry little spears and bows and arrows, and conduct silent trade with other tribes in the forest. They will place a piece of meat at the hut of a man of another tribe, and expect a full return of other goods. It docs not do to try and cheat the pigmy. He is small, but be is desperately dangerous. .Many a man has died from a poisoned arrow, ami the pigmy who fired it inis never been seep. They have very nionkey-like faces and great hairy chests. Also they are very strong, lust as strong as the normalnegro. They climb lives as well as. the cat, and are as near to the Tnrzan tvpe as you can imagine. Apparently they are always on the move, for when tbev have scared away the game they follow it. Strangely enough, they are neither nude or cannibalistic, and usually wear a bark cloth or a leaf. They are wonderful marksmen. I tried them with a small mark on a tree at twenty yards, and all who used the how and arrow shot practically on the. mark. main’ right in the spot. As a result of their oonfnmd, hidden I hv for they have sallow, ochre-like complexions. How many of these pigmies live in the great forest ? No one knows/’